


less yesterday, more today

by chronoshift



Category: Overwatch RPF
Genre: M/M, Time Loop, too much LTJ
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-18
Updated: 2017-12-18
Packaged: 2019-02-12 17:22:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12964524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chronoshift/pseuds/chronoshift
Summary: Injae tries (and tries, and tries, and tries).





	less yesterday, more today

**Author's Note:**

  * For [twoif](https://archiveofourown.org/users/twoif/gifts).
  * Translation into 中文 available: [【授权翻译】Less yesterday, more today](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17703398) by [ngc4151](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ngc4151/pseuds/ngc4151), [Su1](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Su1/pseuds/Su1), [zhimothedude](https://archiveofourown.org/users/zhimothedude/pseuds/zhimothedude)



> _'cause i keep ending up exactly where i start._ title from a kevin devine song.
> 
> i hate apologizing in author's notes, but this isn't the story you were supposed to receive because i overestimated my ability to form words. instead, you're getting my attempt at a "twoif" story. i hope i did your unhappy endings justice. happy holidays!

Injae wakes up to an average day. He shuffles to the kitchen, stopping by his desk to boot up his computer on the way, and waits for the kettle, rubbing his bleary eyes like it isn't nearly noon. His fugue state is broken by the sound of Taejun cursing from the bathroom, and Injae makes a half-hearted effort to call out, asking what's wrong. 

"I dropped the fucking hair dryer on my toe," Taejun shouts back. 

He acknowledges Younghoon and Kyunghoon, both readying a game, and sinks down in his chair. The Overwatch desktop icon almost seems to be staring up at him. It's not some unremarkable day—tomorrow, Seoul Dynasty will take off on a plane to Los Angeles and Injae will remind himself that this was his choice, that he made the decision to play Battlegrounds himself. 

He has two years left before the military comes knocking on his door. He wants to win new titles, unlock new achievements. These are things that he knows, but there's a lingering doubt, a heavy stone in his throat that makes the words hard to get out when he says, "I'm happy with my decision."

Funny enough, it's a lot like the feeling he gets when he looks at Jehong just a second too long.

And, speaking of Jehong. "Do you think you could skip out on seeing Jehong tonight?" Injae asks when Taejun sits down at his computer. 

Taejun looks at him, eyes narrowing. Injae takes a sip of his instant coffee (too much water, fuck) and tries to look innocent. 

Finally, Taejun says, "You want some alone time, huh?" 

"Fuck off," Injae says, "it's not like that." 

"Sure," Taejun replies, drawing out the word pointedly. Injae makes like he's going to dump his shitty coffee in Taejun's lap and Taejun says, "Okay, okay. You can have your date."

 

It was never Injae's intention to fall in love with Jehong. Maybe it's rarely anyone's intention to fall in love, but it was doubly true in this case. Jehong had a _mullet_ , back then, and Injae's only prior experience with boys was a fumbled handjob in the bathroom on a class trip to Gapyeong. 

But the first time Jehong smiled at him, saying, in a voice that already had an ease of familiarity, "Same age, right?"—Injae knew he was fucked. 

Jehong was loud, with an aura around him that seemed to fill entire rooms. He reminded Injae of a dog, a large one with lots of fur prone to jumping up and knocking people over, but never with bad intentions. He would shout and disparage, then when practice was over, make up for it with a joke or an elbow to the ribs, reminding everyone that he yelled because he cared. He loved food and could eat the dorm out of house and home. Injae found himself saving his leftovers for Jehong, casually hoarding the best pieces of meat so that he could offer them to Jehong at the end of a meal. 

And Injae, he was smart, tactical. It was his strength as a player. He had mechanics, but his brain let him shine. He was certainly smarter than a crush on a straight guy, a straight _teammate_ , nonetheless. He assumed, naively, that it would go away on its own. 

Jehong left for the military, a fresh buzzcut that Taejun and Injae spent several minutes laughing at. It wasn't like Jehong was ugly—Injae could never bring himself to think that—but it was so different from his mental image of Jehong that he couldn't hide his amusement. Jehong swung at him, tugging Injae under his arm and rubbing a fist against Injae's scalp. "Don't laugh," he said, as Injae tried to wriggle free. "This will be you soon, and you won't be so handsome without any hair." 

Injae's cheeks were pink when Jehong released him. On the bus ride home, Injae thought about the two years that Jehong would be away. Without oxygen to feed the fire, he hoped his feelings would die out on their own. 

Black Squad is where Injae made his name. He was good at it - a slower pace meant that he could rely less on mechanics and more on his decision making. He was the best rifler on the team, an MVP. Jehong heard about the competitions over chicken and beer while on leave. When everyone else was busy talking to each other, he huddled closer to Injae. 

"You have to wait for me," Jehong said. "We have to play together."

"We're going to win together," Injae said, feeling his pulse all the way up in his throat. He could feel Jehong's breath on his cheek, and he knew he was a fool to think that things would change. 

 

Jehong meets him at a tteokbokki tent in Jongno, not far from the station. He's already got a plate of tteokbokki and odeng in front of him, a paper cup filled with what, knowing Jehong, must be soju. He looks up when he sees Injae, grinning in that warm, dopey way. The tops of his cheeks are flushed already and despite the cold weather he's warm when he pulls Injae in for a hug. 

"I'm going to miss Korean food," Jehong says when he's seated again, reaching across the table for a skewer. 

Injae drinks from his own paper cup, downing the whole thing in a few large swallows. He wants to be drunk as soon as possible, something to give them an easier goodbye. "There's Korean food in LA, dumbass. And you're going to have a Korean chef anyway," Injae points out.

"But not this," Jehong says, gesturing around the tent. 

There are other couples, groups of friends, even a pair of businessmen drinking over tteokbokki, all of them laughing and leaning in close to hear over the buzz of conversation and the sizzle of oil from the stoves. It reminds Injae of the night he went out with Changsik and Kyunghoon and Jinmo, stumbling over each other's feet and shooting off firecrackers over the sea. Or Jehong's last day before the army, another goodbye that Injae wasn't prepared to make, when Jehong got so drunk on makgeolli that Injae had to prop him up on the walk home. He'd helped Jehong take off his shoes in the foyer and Jehong said, voice slurring, "I love you, Injae." 

Now, sitting across from Jehong, Injae pours himself more soju. 

"Fancy mansion, private chef," Injae says. "Worth some sacrifices." 

They eat until Injae feels like he's been stuffed, while Jehong picks at the scraps with his chopsticks. Injae isn't ready to leave Jehong yet and he can't say what he wants to say here, surrounded by people. "Do you want to take a walk?" 

Cheonggyecheon isn't far. At this time of night, it's not totally deserted, but the noise from the streets above is surprisingly quiet over the gentle stream current. The trees lining the streets are wrapped with string lights for Christmas and they reflect onto the water, casting a romantic glow over everything. Injae's hands are sweating despite the cold and he shoves them into his pockets, aiming for casual and landing somewhere closer to conspicuously nervous. Fortunately, outside of games, Jehong isn't nearly as observant. 

"How are the new guys?" Injae asks. 

Jehong shrugs. "You know, they're good. Byungsun especially, but Daekook's pretty good too. They're learning. And Battlegrounds? Is Kyunghoon hyung driving you nuts?" 

"He's so _loud_. He's almost as bad as you," Injae says, brushing his elbow against Jehong.

"I'm offended," Jehong says. "No one is as bad as me."

A block passes in silence, and then Jehong reaches out, stopping Injae with a hand to his arm. "You're going to do great," he says.

"What do you mean?"

"At Battlegrounds," Jehong explains. "I know you will."

Injae laughs, or maybe it's more of an involuntary yelp, something bordering on hysteria. "Shouldn't I be saying this to you? I'm not the one who's leaving."

"I wish you were," Jehong says.

When Injae first told Jehong he was thinking of quitting Overwatch, Jehong thought he was joking. "Come on, of course you're going to LA," he said. As Injae began to take the decision more seriously, Jehong cycled through the whole grieving process, starting with bargaining ("Just one year") and a few days of anger ("I can't believe you would just give up like this") that culminated in the silent treatment. Injae hadn't expected the depression. "I need you," Jehong said, uncharacteristically sincere. "Who am I going to rely on without you?" 

And it was this, the way that a single look from Jehong could have Injae thinking about derailing his plans, that convinced Injae. "I can't," he'd told Jehong then and he tells him now, focusing on the lights rippling across the water. Anywhere but Jehong. 

"You keep saying that," Jehong says, "but I don't know why you can't. We've finally made it, why would you quit now?"

"Because I love you." Injae sucks in a breath, steeling his nerves before he looks up at Jehong. "And sometimes you do things that make me think that you love me too, not like a friend. But you-" He trails off, waiting for the inevitable.

"Injae," Jehong says, softly. "I'm not, I. I'm sorry, I don't-"

"I wish you did," Injae echoes. He thought that he'd been prepared for this, but it hurts, more than any previous defeat, more than any previous heartbreak. "I'm just going to throw myself into the river."

Jehong smiles reflexively and seems to catch himself a moment later, face settling back into a frown. "You can't- fuck. You can't quit Overwatch because of me." 

"Don't be so vain," Injae says. "It's not just because of you. I've got a limited amount of time left and I want to make another name for myself." These are the reasons he is sure of, it shouldn't feel so much like a justification. 

"Injae," Jehong says again, taking a step closer. He reaches for Injae's arm, gripping him firmly around the wrist. "I want you to be happy, you know?"

Jehong's eyes are red and his voice is unsteady and now Injae feels awful on two fronts. "Then stop crying, you asshole. I'm the one who should be upset," he says.

Injae lets himself be pulled in, close enough for Jehong to rest his forehead against Injae's, close enough to feel the breath on his cheeks when Jehong mumbles, "I'm really sorry." Then, just as quickly as he'd pulled Injae in, Jehong steps back. They're only standing a meter apart, but it feels wider than the river, wider than the whole ocean that's about to come between them.

 

 

 

Injae wakes up slowly, coming into consciousness like wading through something thick and heavy. He feels the regret hangover acutely, a pressure behind his eyes. He'd be content to spend the morning in bed, but he needs the practice and hopes that keeping his mind busy will help him to forget about the rejection. 

The clock in the kitchen reads ten til noon as Injae dumps a packet of instant coffee into his hot water. His mind is elsewhere, back on a sidewalk in Cheonggyecheon, but his trance is broken by a loud curse from the bathroom.

"What's wrong?" he calls out. 

"I dropped the fucking hair dryer on my toe," Taejun shouts back. 

"Again?" 

"What do you mean 'again'?"

Injae walks around the corner to the bathroom. Taejun is primping his hair in the mirror as though he isn't planning on sitting in front of a computer for the next twelve hours. "You dropped it on your foot yesterday," Injae accuses.

In the mirror, Taejun looks at Injae like he's grown a third head. "No I didn't."

"Yes, you did. I was in the kitchen and I asked you what was wrong."

"Honestly, I didn't even know we had a hair dryer until today," Taejun says, holding his hands up defensively. "Are you sure you're not having deja vu?"

There's a strange feeling in the pit of Injae's stomach that he can't put a finger on, but he says, "Right. Deja vu." Taejun just shrugs at him. 

The feeling bothers him while he waits for his computer to boot up and it bothers him when he swallows down some painkillers with his coffee. He'd added too much water, which is not only kind of gross but also, in a way that makes no sense, familiar. Injae wonders if everything is bound to be fucked up with this day. 

He even makes it through an entire game before he notices. When he minimizes the screen, the date at the corner of the desktop is so glaringly obvious that Injae can't believe he didn't see it before. It's yesterday. Sunday. The day before Seoul Dynasty leaves, a day that he's already lived through.

Injae immediately pinches himself and it hurts. He looks around the room to see if anything is amiss, like Younghoon and Kyunghoon would have the same face if he focused hard enough, or all the furniture is actually from his childhood home, but there's nothing out of the ordinary. It doesn't feel like a dream. It feels real.

He fires off a quick message to Jehong. _where are you?_ In the time it takes for Jehong to reply, Injae is now half-convinced that he's going crazy or that it's an elaborate joke. _at the dorm why??_ , Jehong responds, then a moment later followed up with, _we're still on for 9, yeah?_

So it can't be a joke, not when Jehong should be on a plane to Los Angeles. 

"How do you know if you're going crazy?" Injae asks out loud.

Only Younghoon hears him over his headphones and he shrugs, shaking his head. 

Searching on Naver gives him nothing but conspiracy theorists, people who should probably actually seek help, and a couple of pages about the movie Groundhog Day, which is, according to one user, a masterpiece unlike anything made today. None of this tells Injae why he's repeating the same day. 

He lets the afternoon drag on as it did the first time. He eats a late lunch prepared by their maid, watches an episode of a drama with Kyunghoon, sends bad memes to Chansik, and tries not to check the calendar obsessively to see if, by some miracle, anything's changed. He plays some games and loses most of them. The minutes seem to crawl by, drawing out each conversation he's already heard, each joke he's already laughed at. Even the passengers on the subway car to Jongno feel familiar.

"Is everything okay?" Jehong asks halfway into dinner. "You're quiet."

"Not feeling well," Injae says. He nudges some fried chicken onto Jehong's plate to distract him. 

It's weird, sitting across from Jehong while his mind is preoccupied with a truth only he knows. Jehong is happily chatting about their new manager and how Byungsun fell asleep during their profile photoshoot and Injae is lying to him. 

"Actually, do you want to go for a walk?" he asks, interrupting Jehong.

Jehong looks down at their uneaten food. "Are you sure?"

"I think I could use some fresh air."

On this walk, Injae stops early on at a bench, motioning for Jehong to join him. There are things he wants to say, that he'd planned to say, but instead what comes out is, "Do you remember when we first met?"

Jehong lets out a quiet laugh. "You were a loser," he says.

"Me?" Injae protests. "You had a _mullet_. Not that your hair right now is any better." 

"So rude to your best friend who just bought you dinner," Jehong says, shaking his head. "I take back the nice things I was going to say about you."

It's not hard to see the differences between them. Jehong takes up space, not just physically. He's brash where Injae is reserved, loud where Injae is quiet, and has always worn his heart on his sleeve. The forced compliments during interviews and _tell each other how you feel_ questions are always awkward for him, but Injae has never doubted the sincerity behind Jehong's words. Even after years of playing together, their differences haven't amounted to much. There's a lot that Injae could praise about Jehong's kindness, his work ethic, or his loyalty, but Injae knows that without him, he would've never made it this far. 

"We've come a long way," Injae says, looking out over the river. 

"We could go even further," Jehong says. "If you were coming with us."

Injae swallows around the lump in his throat. "What if you stayed instead?"

"What?"

"What if you stayed and played with me?"

"I couldn't," Jehong says, "I want to play Overwatch."

"More than you want to play with me."

"Playing with you was the plan, that's what I wanted. Both of us playing together."

Injae stands, needing to put some space between them. "When you asked me for one more year, I really thought about it, you know? I didn't want to, but I almost did it, just because you asked me to."

"I don't know what-" Jehong scoots closer to him, reaching a hand out for Injae. 

"Ever since we first met, I really thought I could play with you forever. But it's not just that, it's more than just playing. I wanted to be near you." Injae doesn't know what he's saying any more. He lost the script somewhere, maybe back at their table. "You keep saying that you need me, but it's not the same as what I want."

Jehong's fingers, kept warm from his jacket pocket, wrap around Injae's wrist for the second time in two days. "I don't know what you're upset about. Can you just calm down and we can talk about what you're upset about? I don't want this to be how we leave."

"Either way, you're leaving," Injae says, tugging his arm away from Jehong. "I'm going to go."

He can hear Jehong call his name as he turns to leave, but Injae can't look back. He feels too childish, too dramatic to face anyone right now. With shame bubbling up in his chest, Injae is back to hoping for a dream.

 

 

 

Injae wakes with a start. Taejun is snoring in the bed beside him and the only light coming in through their blinds is from the streetlamps. Injae grapples for his phone in the dark, heart pounding in his chest. He feels suspended halfway between a dream and reality—a repeated day is impossible, but the memory of it is too fresh, too real to have been imagined. 

When he finally finds his phone under his pillow, Injae's fears are confirmed. Sunday the 26th, the third one he's woken up to. It's half past five in the morning, the only notable change from the previous days. 

Disoriented, Injae does the only thing he can think of—he texts Jehong, waits a dignified five seconds for Jehong to respond, and then calls him. 

Jehong's voice is muffled when he answers the phone. "Injae?" 

"Can you meet me?" Injae whispers. 

He can hear Jehong rolling over and imagines him, shirtless and a little sweaty, pillow lines across his cheeks. Injae's chest gives a dull ache. "It's, like, five in the morning."

"I know," Injae says, "please?"

Jehong sighs. "Where?"

Injae meets him in front of the Seoul Dynasty dorm. The building is decorated with large wreaths and twinkling lights on the trees lining the street, deserted at this time of night. Injae hadn't dressed for the weather and his bare ankles are cold as he approaches Jehong. 

"What's going on?" Jehong asks. "Can we at least go inside?" 

Sure, inside is warm but there's a doorman and Injae has to be alone with Jehong right now. On his third go-around, Injae might have expected to have a plan, but he's operating purely on impulse. He's not even sure why he wanted to do this, but now that he's here, Injae spits it out. "I've been in love with you for years."

"I'm sorry, what?" 

"Practically since we met," Injae says. "Even when you did your enlistment and I tried to date girls, I thought about you." Now that he's started, he can't seem to make himself stop. "For a while, I thought you might feel the same. And then I started thinking that you were just fucking with me on purpose, but you're not that much of a dick."

Jehong drops his head, looking down at the ground. "Injae, I didn't know."

"You didn't know?" 

Injae doesn't get mad often. His typical range of emotions includes acting cute to get donations, triumphant smugness when he does well during matches, and forlornly watching Jehong smile. Anger isn't one of them and Injae doesn't know what to do with it, fists clenching weakly down at his thighs. 

"Jinmo knew. Junhyuk knew. Fuck, Seungjoon knew and he hasn't even gone through puberty."

"I don't even know why you're telling me this," Jehong says, raising his voice defensively. "What do you want me to say? I'm sorry? Because I am sorry, Injae. I would never want to hurt you but I don't know what you want from me." 

"I don't know either," Injae admits. Maybe it's the weight of bad decisions that's making his legs feel like jelly, or maybe he's just fucking tired, but standing feels like too much effort and he sinks down to the curb. A moment later, Jehong joins him. 

They sit until Injae can no longer feel his toes in his sneakers. Jehong is uncharacteristically silent and Injae has no idea what he could be thinking. 

"I'm sorry for yelling at you," Injae finally says. "Let's pretend it didn't happen." 

Jehong leans over, tucking his head against Injae's shoulder. "I'll miss you." 

 

The sun is rising when Injae makes it back to the dorm. Taejun, mercifully, is still asleep, and it's easy for Injae to slip back into his bed unnoticed. 

Later, when Taejun asks if he's coming to meet Jehong, Injae lies. "I'm not feeling well, go without me," he says. "I already told Jehong."

When it's finally close to midnight, Injae watches the minutes tick by on his phone's clock, unsure of what he'll wake up to tomorrow. 

 

 

 

 

By the fourth time it happens, Injae can tell that it's the same morning just by the slant of the sunlight through the curtains. For a while, he very seriously contemplates spending the entire 24 hours in bed, trying to catch up on the years of sleep debt he's incurred. Going to bed at 4 in the morning and waking up past noon was his dream at 12 years old, but now he hasn't gone to bed before midnight in a decade. 

As if he needed any more confirmation, he hears Taejun cursing from the bathroom, and Injae covers his face with his pillow. He lies in bed long enough for Taejun to come check up on him. "You okay dude?" Taejun asks, peering around the door. 

"Maybe," Injae says.

"Are you coming to practice?"

Injae sits up. "No, I'm going to Busan," he says, the first place that comes to mind. 

"You're going where?" Taejun asks.

"Busan," Injae says, now with vigor. He searches around his bed for yesterday's pants and shirt, while Taejun looks at him skeptically. .

"Uh. Why?"

"Because I can," Injae shrugs. 

Taejun follows him out of the room and into the foyer. The other guys don't appear to notice him, too deep into their games. "Seriously, what's going on? We have practice." 

Injae pulls one shoe on, reaching for the other. "I'm fine. This is just something I need to do," he says. "Don't worry, you won't remember it anyway."

Whatever Taejun says after that, Injae doesn't hear him, the door already shutting behind him. He hasn't been anywhere that wasn't for a game-related event in ages. Just like sleep, even the thought of getting on a train and taking it somewhere on his own feels a little foreign. 

There's nothing waiting for him in Busan except fond memories of it. He used to come to the beach with his parents and his sister when he was younger, entire days spent playing in the sand and splashing each other with water before eating fresh seafood for dinner. By the time he was in middle school, he was already falling into games and a day outside was rare. No matter how much sunscreen his mother applied, his skin burned immediately, as though the sun was a predator going for the easiest target. 

It's winter, but when Injae walks out onto the beach, face turned to the sun, he can almost feel the dull ache and residual heat of sunburn across his cheeks. 

In his pocket, his phone buzzes again. He has multiple missed calls from Taejun and Kyunghoon, and another from their coach. The newest notification is a message from Jinmo, asking, _where are you? you ok?_

And, no. He's not. It's been half a week now of the same day and he's not okay. He wonders, halfheartedly, if he walked into the sea now, would he wake up? A hard reset?

The situation isn't that dire, not yet, but Injae is so fucking tired of it. He's run through a list of possibilities more times than he can count and he still can't figure out what the universe wants from him. If he's meant to save someone's life, maybe prevent some sort of crime or disaster—well, he needs it to be spelled out more clearly. Either that or he's having a psychotic break, or maybe he's died and gone to his personal hell and neither of those are great options. 

When in doubt, the only thing left to do is drink.

Injae ends up in a bar off the beach, a hole-in-the-wall with peeling paint and several old men playing Go over coffee. The bartender doesn't look all that surprised to be serving Injae shots at 2 in the afternoon. 

He's well and truly hammered come evening. The bartender has long since cut him off, but Injae is hoping for a shift change, another bartender who won't know how much he's had. He didn't bring his charger with him and his phone's almost dead, racking up more ignored notifications.

At least two of them are from Jehong. First, a call, then a follow-up text immediately after. _call me pls i want to talk_. 

With his last 5%, Injae calls Jehong, face resting against the surface of the bar. He must look pathetic. Jehong answers, frantic. 

"Injae? Where are you? Taejun said you just left." 

"I'm not sure?" Injae says. 

He can hear voices on the other end of the line, probably belonging to Jinmo or Gido, asking what's going on. There's a part of Injae that feels guilty for making his friends worry, but it doesn't matter. They won't remember it in five hours. 

"I'm going to send someone to come get you," Jehong says. 

Injae sighs. There is something sticky on the bar under his cheek. "Don't do that. I'll be fine, I'll be back soon." 

"I'm leaving tomorrow, Injae."

"Soon," Injae repeats. In the distance, Jinhyuk asks, _Is he dead?_ and Jehong covers his phone with his hand to chastise him. "Jehong," Injae says. "Jehooooong."

"What?"

"I love you. Don't date any American girls."

Jehong is quiet for a long moment and the background noise gets quiet, fading until Injae hears a door close. "What did you say?"

"I said I love you." Injae lifts his head, just enough to slide his arm under his face, and the girl next to him shoots him a sympathetic look. "I will be sad if you date."

"I'm sorry, I don't-"

And Injae has heard this before, each rejection sounding like the world's worst remix. He laughs, cutting Jehong off. "Hey, if you come get me now, I'll give you a blowjob."

Next to him, the girl chokes on her drink. 

"Jesus Christ," Jehong says. 

"My phone is dying," Injae tells him. "I'll be okay and you won't even remember this tomorrow. I'm sorry for making you worry." He hangs up before he can hear what Jehong has to say.

By the end of the night, Injae's stumbled down the street to a motel where he can spend his last few hours. The last thing he remembers thinking, lying in a cocoon of soft blankets, is that this time, he's actually hoping he wakes up in his own bed. 

 

 

 

 

Injae wakes up in the middle of the night, this time with much less panic. He fishes his phone out from under his back where it's lodged itself and confirms the date, Sunday for the fifth time. He feels defeated, worse than losing to GC Busan _twice_ , worse than seeing his name surrounded by a barrage of negative comments on Inven. 

Until now, he hasn't thought about telling anyone. In the best case scenario, even if someone did believe him, the next time Injae wakes up, he'd go back to being alone. But now, feeling like he could cry, there's only one person he want to talk to, the same person Injae has always gone to for his stress. 

He calls Jehong.

At a park on the outskirts of the neighborhood, Injae waits at the swings, hunching down into the fur collar of his parka. If there's one lesson he should know by now, it's to dress more warmly when meeting someone in the middle of the night. Jehong approaches the swingset cautiously, squinting like he's not sure if he'll see Injae or a homeless man. 

"Injae? What are you doing out here?"

"Sit with me," Injae says, patting the empty swing next to him. Jehong is still visibly confused, but he does it, looking comically oversized in the child's swing. 

"Is everything okay?" he asks. 

"Do you trust me?"

"Of course I do, but are you okay? Is this some kind of nervous breakdown?"

Injae looks at him. In this iteration, it would've been over a week since the last time he saw Jehong. Now on his fifth cycle, it's only been a day, but if he ever breaks the cycle, there's no telling when he will see Jehong again. "It might be a nervous breakdown," he says. "But do you trust me anyway?"

"Yes," Jehong says.

So Injae explains it all. The confessions, the first and the second, the trip to Busan and drinking for 12 hours until he passed out in a seedy motel bed. Jehong takes it in stride, for once not interrupting, even as his eyes widen in surprise. It feels good to get it all off his chest, but the more Injae talks, the more aware he is of how _crazy_ he sounds. "So, should I check myself into a hospital or something?" he jokes after he's finished. 

"You're not crazy. But then again, if you are, I would just be your own delusion telling you that," Jehong teases, but it's obvious his heart isn't in it and his mouth settles into a frown. "Injae, you said that you loved me."

"I know. And here is the part where you say that you don't think of me like that and then you get all sad, which makes me feel even worse." Injae waves his hand like _get on with it_. "We've been down this path before."

"Why now?" Jehong asks instead. 

Injae traces a line in the dirt with the toe of his sneaker. "I thought it would give me closure, I guess."

"And did it?" Jehong asks. 

"No," Injae says with a small, sad chuckle. "It hasn't really done me any good so far. Like, I don't know if I was hoping you'd say you felt the same, or if you'd say that in another lifetime it would've worked out." Without realizing, he's drawn _L-H_ in the dirt and he runs his foot over it, smearing it away. 

"Or that if you had told me, I would've fought harder for you to come to LA?"

"Or that," Injae says, heart giving an involuntary clench.

Jehong pushes himself a little closer, resting against the chain of Injae's swing. "I'm sorry," he says. "I wish I could say what you wanted me to say, but it's too late, you know?"

It's not a grand epiphany, no lightbulb going off over Injae's head, but Jehong's words give him pause. "How do you know if you're making a mistake?" Injae asks. 

"Because it doesn't feel right?" Jehong guesses. "I don't know. What do you mean?"

"I think I keep making the same one."

Their coach used to borrow from that one saying, telling them that the definition of insanity was doing the same shitty play over and over again for the 1 out of 100 times they could pull it off. Maybe Injae is crazy, but not in the way he thought.  


"This helped," he tells Jehong.

"I don't know what I did," Jehong says, grinning, "but I'm glad it helped."

The city around them is quiet, not even the early risers up and stirring yet. Somehow the world seems narrowed down to just the two of them and their shared secret. It's the only time Injae's felt something close to comfort in days. 

When Injae turns to look at Jehong, their faces are closer than he expected. Even in the dark, this close Injae can see clearly see the freckle above Jehong's lips and the lines around his eyes. It's not the first time that they've been this close, or the first time that Injae has wanted to kiss him with the kind of desire typically reserved for teen girls and their posters of boy band members. "Hey, if you're not going to remember this tomorrow anyway," Injae says, "how about a kiss?"

He can practically feel the heat radiating off of Jehong's cheeks when he blushes. "Bad idea," Jehong says, but he leans in anyway.

A moment before they kiss, Injae lets his eyes slip shut. It's brief, chapped lips against chapped lips and their noses brushing, but the wet warmth of Jehong's mouth is good enough for Injae. One for the road.

 

 

 

Injae wakes up to the sound of Taejun cursing from the bathroom. He doesn't have to call out to him to know what's wrong. He makes it through this Sunday with a nervous energy, finding himself bringing his fingers to his lips to remember the feeling of Jehong's mouth against his. He tries not to say anything weird, though he can't stop himself from delivering the punchline of one of Kyunghoon's jokes early. 

"So you've heard that one?" Kyunghoon asks. 

"A few times."

He debates letting Taejun tag along to their dinner, but in the end, Injae decides that he still wants the alone time with Jehong. Taejun makes the same joke about a date, but this time Injae just laughs it off. 

At the same tent in Jongno, Jehong is waiting with his tteokbokki and odeng, his rosy cheeks and awful haircut. A perfect replica of the previous nights, even the same ahjummas preparing food at the grills. Injae sees Jehong first and he pauses at the edge of the tent, just watching him in his element. This Jehong doesn't know they kissed, doesn't know the weight in Injae's stomach, but he's better for it. 

"Injae!" Jehong shouts, finally noticing him. 

He hugs Injae tightly and his presence is warm and solid, the only thing that's felt truly tangible in these time loops. 

"I'm going to miss Korean food," Jehong says, grabbing another skewer. 

"There's Korean food in LA," Injae tells him. He pours himself a cup of soju, but there's no urgency this time. "And you'll have a Korean chef, I don't think you'll have any trouble getting fed."

Jehong gestures around the tent. "But not this! Wouldn't you miss this?"

"Do you remember when we went out for Minseok's birthday?" Injae asks, and this gets Jehong on a roll, reminiscing about falling over each other in a packed karaoke room and somehow waking up the next day with a sticky rice cake in his hair. 

"You okay?" Jehong asks when he's finished his story, eyeing Injae suspiciously. 

"I didn't sleep well," Injae lies, "but don't worry, I'm fine. I'm happy to be here."

For the third time, Injae suggests a walk. It almost feels like retracing footsteps down to the river, the streetlights and trees casting familiar shadows. Injae lets the first block pass quietly and then, before Jehong can do it, he stops them. 

"I'm sorry I couldn't keep my promise," Injae says. "I know you think that you need me, but you don't. You've never needed me, you've always been capable of being a leader."

"Injae-"

"I need to figure out what kind of player I am with a new team. It's my last chance to make a name for myself before I go off to the army and I had to take it," Injae continues. "But we're going to play together again. Even if we're old men playing Go, you can't get rid of me that easily."

Injae lets out a deep breath when he's finished. To his surprise, Jehong's eyes are wet. "I made you cry again," Injae says, laughing.

"Don't make fun of me," Jehong says as he simultaneously elbows Injae in the stomach and tugs him in for a hug. 

"I love you," Injae tells him. He keeps his words light and friendly, without any of the deeper meaning. 

Jehong says it back, his mouth pressed against Injae's shoulder, and Injae lets himself relax into it. There's a half of him that knows how his heart has been stomped on for days in a row, but the other half of him is relieved that he's made Jehong cry not out of sadness, but out of sentiment. He doesn't quite feel better, but he doesn't feel worse. It's this moment, Injae decides, that's worth more than any closure. 

Before they part ways at the station, Jehong demands one more hug. "We'll see each other again, damn," Injae says, pretending to protest, which only encourages Jehong to squeeze him harder. 

"Goodbye, Kim Injae," Jehong says. 

"See you later, Ryu Jehong."

 

 

 

Injae wakes up to a pillow in his face. 

"What the fuck?" he tries to say, which, with a mouthful of pillow, comes out more like a series of grunts. 

"We have our company physicals in an hour," Taejun says. 

Injae throws the pillow aside, squinting up at Taejun. "What day is it?"

"It's Monday," Taejun says from across the room, head popping out of the hoodie he'd been pulling on. "I don't remember the date." 

"Monday?" Injae repeats, and then to himself, more quietly, "It's Monday." Which means it isn't Sunday, which means that time has corrected itself. Injae pumps his fist in excitement. 

"What are you so happy about?" Taejun asks. 

Injae rolls over, looking out over the cloudy Seoul skyline, another notable difference from the previous days. Jehong is leaving, and Injae went through five cycles of the same timeline only to realize that there was no happy ending for his choose-your-own-adventure, but now, at least, time can move on. "Just ready for a new week."

**Author's Note:**

> let's pretend like _leaving for LA_ has more finality / please excuse any canon errors


End file.
